


Gelatin Nightmares and Oxygen Dreams

by Tea_and_Nightmarescapes (Anxious_Trickster)



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Disturbing Content, Dreams and Nightmares, Explicit and metaphorical, Horror, Luther Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Luther is bad at poetry, Luther-centric, Luther-friendly, Nightmares, Psychological Horror, Reginald Hargreeves' A+ Parenting, Suicidal Thoughts, The infamous comet poem, Water is scary too, even though I put him through a lot, no beta we die like men, space is scary
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-30
Updated: 2019-06-30
Packaged: 2020-05-30 22:32:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19412752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anxious_Trickster/pseuds/Tea_and_Nightmarescapes
Summary: If he looked for too long into the black, he’d see movement. He remembered reading about this sort of thing once. About how if you look into the darkness long enough, you start to see faces out of nothing. Just a natural product of human evolution. Just your mind playing tricks. He remembered reading it, so it must be true, so everything's alright.ORLuther isn’t as alone on the moon as he thinks he is …





	Gelatin Nightmares and Oxygen Dreams

**Author's Note:**

> For the Summer of Seven prompt: _Mysterious as the dark side of the moon_
> 
> A disclaimer: The whole "dark side of the moon" thing is an inaccurate description. There is no shadow that perpetually cloaks one side of the moon. There is a side of the moon we never get to see, but it experiences day and night, same as us. That being said, I took the dividing line between the “light and dark side” of the moon myth and ran with it. 
> 
> Be mindful of the tags

Luther thought he had prepared for his mission on the moon. 

The truth of the matter was there was no way he could have.

He could have never pictured looking out his window and seeing planet earth in all its glory. He could not have imagined the way his chest swelled; struck with some unnameable emotion, an epiphany in the back of his mind, on the tip of his tongue, just out of reach. 

Luther could not have prepared himself for a loneliness so strong it hurt like hunger. 

* * *

But most importantly, Luther had not anticipated the dark side of the moon and it’s haunting visage. 

It was a striking wall of black, it’s bricks made of the holes in the fabric of reality. One great _nothing nothing nothing_. 

The line breaking apart the light and dark side of the moon was stark and clear, in the way that life never is. It was as if the universe had gotten tired of making itself and trailed off there. 

It was the side of the moon that faces the cold blank expanse of space. A monument. Some terrible Rubicon, taunting him to cross. 

Luther sometimes imagined that if he were to cross that threshold, he’d be enveloped. That he’d be embraced by an azure gelatin, and find himself transported to another world. It would be then that he that he would take off his helmet and breathe in deeply. 

In reality, he would probably just freeze. 

If he looked for too long into the black, he’d see movement. He remembered reading about this sort of thing once. About how if you look into the darkness long enough, you start to see faces out of nothing. Just a natural product of human evolution. Just your mind playing tricks. He remembered reading it, so it must be true, so everything's alright. 

* * *

On the moon, Luther often dreamed he was floating in a great expanse of water. He never used to get this dream, but then again, he never dreamed much at home anyway.

The body of water was impossibly large like he was in the ocean, and impossibly deep like had already drowned. The water would always be pleasantly cool and dark, gently rocking him back and forth. It was hypnotic. He was at peace.

In the dream, Luther would suddenly get the overpowering feeling that something terrible and large was underneath him. The animal part of his brain screamed that he was in the presence of some primordial and unknowable beast; that he was a speck of dust in the face of a colossal being. 

Luther would find himself unable to move his head as to look behind him, the creature could only be felt in the disturbances in the water. And when he’d wake up, the feeling would linger. The nights in which dream bleed into reality, were the ones in which he’d go rigid, with wide eyes, afraid to look under his bed. In a strange wave of nostalgia, he was reminded of Ben’s monsters.

* * *

The noise was hardly bearable. The shuttle always made a monotonous droning sound that made him feel crazy if he focused too hard on it. Luther missed his vinyl player. He asked Dad to send him something to listen to music on, but he never heard back. It was alright though, Dad is a busy man, he has very important things on his mind.

Luther requested that he be sent razors to shave his face. Dad asked him why he needed such frivolous supplies as razors, and suddenly he felt stupid, silly, and small.

* * *

Poem about a comet

Comet, come wave at the gas giants and the little rocks on the rock bend

You waved to me too

Thank you

You walked into the room with a jaunty coordination 

One day

Your burning spinning streak will melt into a weary sigh

and melancholy prostration 

Until then

Be well friend

* * *

The thing about space is that there is no escape. Everything keeping you alive is artificial, claustrophobic, and everything can go so so wrong. The thing about space, is that if you don’t wrap yourself in Dacron and fill your lungs with air, it’ll freeze your insides and outsides so thoroughly you’ll shatter like glass. Space is a curse to the body and having a body is a curse, he would know.

* * *

There was someone with him. Objects started to move from their places. His bed’s sheets would become unmade, as if someone had been sleeping in them without his permission. Food was left out, halfway eaten. There couldn’t be someone with him, but there was.

* * *

The thing about space is this, there is no escape. 

* * *

On a day just like any other day, Luther heard a footstep. He happened to be tending to his bonsai tree when he heard the footstep, many footsteps in fact. They seemed to be getting closer. 

A dragging gait, as unmistakable as it was impossible, echoed over the buzz buzz buzz of the electronics, pumping in the oxygen and keeping everything suitable for his human, but not human, life. His stomach churned painfully, but he held himself still. The buzz buzz did not care for his plight and continued to buzz buzz. _He would never be able to hear the stillness of the moon, how odd._ The fluorescent lights hummed. _Could you imagine a world so quiet?_ The lights hummed. He saw something move in the corner of his eye. The lights hummed. It was probably a shadow. The lights hummed. He felt hot breath against his ear. The lights hummed. There was a whisper, real close. The lights hummed. And it said, “Who mourns the broken black stone monolith?”

And there was silence. 

“No one.”

Luther squeezed his eyes shut. He clenched his teeth, and clenched his fists, and curled into himself. He felt like he was going to vomit. He felt like he was going to _fucking_ vomit. He wished he wasn’t here. He wished he was at home. He wished he was dead. He wished he was dead. 

He was Number One. He was the leader. Luther had to be strong, he always had to be strong. He was Number One and he could handle this. Slowly, he turned around. 

In the middle of the room, stood a figure; its back facing towards him. It’s was head raised up as if trying to gaze past the stars themselves. Its hair was long, tangled, and wet. Drops of some mystery fluid slid down its idle arms and off its fingertips. 

“Sp-ace Boy.” It spoke, low and hoarse. This was not the voice from before. He shook and shook with the suffocating impossibility of it all. 

“They c-call y-ou Sp-ace Bo-y.” It choked on the words, like it could not close its mouth enough to say them without swallowing the sounds. Luther prayed it would not turn around. “Do y-ou w-w-ant to kn-ow why?”

The terror had stolen all the air from his lungs, and plucked all the words from his brain, and Luther found himself unable to speak. He made a gurgling sound.

“Th-ey c-call you S-pace Boy bec-ause th-ey know. Ev-ery person kn-ows the se-crets of th-e u-niver-se deep d-own. And th-ey c-an tell.” A sloshing noise was coming from somewhere on its person- _it’s lungs-_ his mind supplied.

It paused.

“You be-long on t-he oth-er s-ide. Turn y-our b-ack on ea-rth and face the sh-daows, Space Bo-y.”

Luther let out a low whine. He breathed out harshly- saliva spraying from his mouth, he clasped his face and dug his fingernails into his cheeks. He turned and ran.

* * *

He’d sometimes see Allison in the black nothing of the moon. On darker days, he’d see Ben. 

* * *

Dad didn’t send enough food again.

* * *

It was a day just like any other day that Luther faced the wall of shadows, and heel to toe, stepped into the void. 

* * *

A month later he got the call that Reginald had died, it was time to go back home.

* * *

Luther had come back different, he knew this. The world had come back different too, so they were even.

Allison told him he seemed older, Diego told him he had become a little less unbearable, Five told time to quit acting so weird, and Klaus nodded in understanding.

When the moon shattered he smiled.

**Author's Note:**

> My first time writing horror. What did y'all think?
> 
> Luther fics are never popular but I wanted to write about my BOY


End file.
